ESPN ranks Seahawks’ Pete Carroll as NFL’s No. 2 coach

Share this:

Carroll, going into his fifth year with Seattle after winning Super Bowl XLVIII, was bested only by New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick in Tuesday’s rankings. Carroll was one of just three coaches in ESPN’s “top tier,” also joining Sean Payton of the New Orleans Saints.

Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll calls to his players during the Chargers preseason game Aug. 15 at CenturyLink Field. (John Froschauer/AP Photo)

ESPN’s rankings were based on voting by “eight current general managers, four former GMs, four personnel directors, four executives, six coordinators and four position coaches,” reporter Mike Sando wrote. Here’s an excerpt from Sando’s comments on Carroll:

Carroll’s sky-high ranking was one of the revelations of this project. I figured Carroll would be on the rise following the Seahawks’ Super Bowl championship, but second in the NFL to Belichick already? …

It has been a total transformation, with Carroll and GM John Schneider working well together to stock the roster with young players the staff has developed consistently. Consider: In the three years before Carroll’s arrival, Seattle lost 19 games by more than seven points. Their current 45-game streak without such a defeat dates to Week 9 of the 2011 season and is the longest in the league. Belichick’s Patriots are second with just two such defeats over the same span. …

The three coaches atop this ranking have all won Super Bowls, but none has won one quite the way Carroll did this past season: 43-8 over a record-setting Denver team. “When you say his name, the first thing you think of is the absolute a– whipping he issued to John Fox in the Super Bowl,” one executive said. “If it had been a tight game and the ball bounced one way at the end, he lucked out. But the absolute dominant fashion they won that game in, people are going, ‘Holy crap.’ No disrespect to Joe Flacco, but he did not beat Flacco. He beat Peyton Manning, and he beat him soundly.”

In the ESPN poll, Carroll was ranked six slots higher than San Francisco 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh, who placed eighth and in the second tier. John Fox, coach of the Super Bowl-losing Denver Broncos, was ranked 10th while Gus Bradley, the former Seattle defensive coordinator now running the show in Jacksonville, ranked 19th and in the third tier.